Winner and still Champion...Kwok Ka-ming

HONG KONG (AP) - At the strike of a gong Monday, 12 competitors
scrambled up a 46-foot tower covered with Chinese buns and snatched
away, relaunching a local tradition after a 26-year break.
Secured by safety ropes, the contestants tossed plastic-wrapped
buns into bags on their backs as hundreds of spectators watched
from below. The climbing sent some buns flying from the tower.
The buns - stuffed with lotus seed paste - were divided into
three zones, with the higher buns worth more points. The competitor
racking up the most points in three minutes was the winner.
The victor had climbing in his blood. Kwok Ka-ming, who scored
453 points - 30 more than his closest competitor - is a firefighter
by trade.
"This win is unexpected," Kwok said. "When I got up there, I
found it was very difficult. Up there you can't hear anything. I
just focused on snatching."
The bun-snatching contest on the suburban island of Cheung Chau
was canceled after a bun tower collapsed in 1978, injuring 100
people.
Officials revived the tradition, part of an annual "bun
festival," this year after implementing improved safety measures.
Workers built a sturdier tower and bun snatchers received
mountaineering training. A preliminary competition reduced the pool
of climbers to 12 finalists.
The festival originated hundreds of years ago when Cheung Chau
residents dressed up as gods to ward off evil spirits they believed
to be responsible for a plague, according to one account.